After a week at the UN General Assembly dominated by discussion of Russia’s war in Ukraine, Moscow struck back on Saturday, with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov addressing delegates first in a speech to the General Assembly hall, then turning to the international press in a wide-ranging briefing full of recriminations against the West – which he described as an “empire of lies.”
In February 2016, Sergey Lavrov claimed, “Russia never violated Budapest memorandum. It contained only one obligation, not to attack Ukraine with nukes.”[38] However, Canadian journalist Michael Colborne pointed out that “there are actually six obligations in the Budapest Memorandum, and the first of them is ‘to respect the independence and sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine’”. Colborne also pointed out that a broadcast of Lavrov’s claim on the Twitter account of Russia’s embassy in the United Kingdom actually “provided a link to the text of the Budapest Memorandum itself with all six obligations, including the ones Russia has clearly violated – right there for everyone to see.”
As so often, it’s probably not actually directed at the western audience, but at Russians in Russia. Give them something to feel just and superior. Given how numerous and blatant his lies are, this rather shows he thinks of them as uneducated and gullible.
Since I just had this quote at hand …
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budapest_Memorandum
As so often, it’s probably not actually directed at the western audience, but at Russians in Russia. Give them something to feel just and superior. Given how numerous and blatant his lies are, this rather shows he thinks of them as uneducated and gullible.